The Worst Of All
by Dreams of Screams
Summary: He didn't just lose a brother, he lost a part of himself. The part that finished his sentences and echoed his thoughts. And this is what made his death the worst of all.


A/N: I do not own Harry Potter

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He was sitting there, in the Great Hall, surrounded by the cold, limp bodies a passerby could only tell were dead because of the emotional people surrounding them. These people were lined in the middle to be mourned, and the sorrow surrounding those dead forced the air to become cold and thin to witnesses.

Families were ripped apart, torn by a strike so quick, so sharp, that nothing could challenge it. The feeling was indescribable if one were to ask a relative who watched their son, nephew, sibling, mother, father or friend lay before them, as icy as the atmosphere before dawn while as peaceful as the earth at sunrise.

There were lives without one to grieve for, of course, but the noise from these individuals were kept to low whispering as they, too, allowed mourning of those they may have passed in the halls or shared a book with in class. The injured did not whine or hiss or grunt, or complain loudly. The most they did was give the healers answers. Those doing the healing worked with the silent swiftness of a machine. They looked over the skin almost falling off of the centaur's flank and the eye missing from the seventeen year old girl, instead choosing the quickest spell to remove the blood and the best regeneration potion which would inevitably only heal the eye socket.

One cry, soft and steady, was louder than the rest of the room.

Though others similar to the boy were standing over the body, he was the only one loud enough for the entire hall to hear. His ear was gone, his robes were battered, his hair was filled with mud, and blood flowed deeply down his arm. But this boy was not sad, nor tired, nor in desire for a shower.

To him, he himself didn't exist.

The body which he was crouched over, the head which he clung to desperately, was identical to his own. Red hair. Pale skin. Tall. But dead. Gone.

The one alive, George Weasley, felt only a void within him, as if one part of him, one half of him, had been stripped away leaving nothing but darkness. Now, there would be no one to finish his sentence, no one to echo his thoughts. No one to understand him better than himself, and no one to rely on to always be there, no matter what in the world you did.

The other members of the family stood by helplessly, having little idea what George was going through. How could they? Only George was identical to Fred. Only George always knew what Fred was thinking. Only George shared a birthday with Fred. Only George had stuck by Fred his entire life. Only George.

And therein lay the reason George was on the floor pleading, begging, praying for Fred to return: _was, knew, shared, had._ Past tense. Gone. No longer would poor George join his brother to create potions specially designed to explode when they added crushed Tentacula leaves. No longer would George join his brother to apparate into the kitchen just to annoy their mother. No longer would Goerge join his brother in detention over the one prank they were actually caught doing, and no longer would they be caught laughing about the other four.

Only a twin like them could understand, and even then, they couldn't, for death is unique to each who feels it, like a flame burning different wood.

Hours went by. Days. His parents had tried to get him to move, they kept telling them of the parties and celebration, but the boy only stayed by his brother. His crying had ceased. Instead, he stared at his brother, pretending he was only sleep, and had faith that in just a few hours, he would awake, and it would all be one huge prank George would get revenge for later.

Eventually, a week had passed. His brother was to be buried. He didn't know quite what happened, but after his mother had offered him water, he fell asleep. The next thing he knew, he was in the hospital wing. He stared at the ceiling and did nothing more.

Some would say he was dead. Some would say he was still hoping for his brother to walk in and ask why he wasn't out there causing havoc at the celebrations. In reality, he was in his past, replaying all he had left of his brother. His other half.

The time they almost forced Ron to make the Unbreakable Vow.

The time they got their first, nearly identical wands.

The time they found the Murauder map.

The time they stole potion ingredients from Snape as Harry got into trouble.

The time they had to cast an invisibility charm in ten seconds to hide the candies from their mum.

The times they tested the candies on the first years.

The time they broke out of Hogwarts with their brooms.

The times they joked.

The times they pranked.

The times they ran away.

The times they served detention.

Gone.

Dead.

Erased.

Eventually, George drug himself out of bed. He did as his parents told him to, and became obedient. For one year, he did nothing but do as others did. He ate, despite his lack of appetite, and talked despite his indifference to how others felt. He said he was fine like a good little boy, but on the inside, he was empty.

His parents urged him to do something else, so he did. By this point, he avoided anything that had to do with his lost brother, and worked. He had found working kept his mind off of Fred, off of everything. So he brewed potions for St. Mungos. He helped rebuild Hogwarts. He kept his house clean and dusted off his closed shop. And that was his life for another year and a half.

George showed up at family reunions and again responded that he was okay, that he was doing alright. He no longer smiled or laughed truly, however. He only listened, for if he spoke for long, he would hear silence afterword, eternally, waiting for the other voice to respond.

His parents told him to get a real job two years later. Hogwarts was rebuilt. St. Mungos hired someone else. He looked and looked, but he could find nothing he was truly interested or qualified in doing considering his lack of N.E.W.T.'s.

Anglina Johnson showed up one day, completely uninvited. He was manually cleaning the floors when she did. She came in wondering if she could have a job, if she could do the cleaning. George told her no. That was his way of hiding, after all.

Angelina kept coming back, however. At first it was to pester him about the job. Then, it turned into talk. Why did he like to clean? What did he like to do nowadays? How was his family doing? Did he have any new ideas? It was nice to talk to her, easy. George began to feel more free to speak, though he did not say much.

Two months later, and George gave her the job just so they could talk. He would sit on a random chair or stand next to her. They asked questions and answered each other as the silence of the empty shop overwhelmed them. She didn't even ask for payment.

They stayed like that for a year.

Then Angelina began to talk about how her night job wasn't doing well, and how she'd have to move. Immediately, George tried to think of a solution to get her to stay. After all, when he spoke of her, he forgot about his missing piece. His missing half.

Within the week, George told her they could start the shop up again. She smiled, and then she agreed to continue working there. For the next four months, they cleaned it up real nice and created new products, ones Zonko's couldn't even compete with.

The reopening of the shop was a success. People everywhere came to buy George's stuff. Angelina helped quite a bit. Eventually, she moved in to a separate room, and they worked the shop all by themselves. In three years, they were perfectly settled in.

George had come to love her. He decided that she was his. After all, she was the only one who truly and unknowingly helped him get through his loss. So one day, he kneeled before her and asked if she could be his bride.

She said yes.

Their wedding wasn't important, and neither were the presents or the money or the fact his mother cried and Angelina's family had finally given their approval. They were together, and even if the piece had been cut to fit, the puzzle of his soul was complete. It had been filled.

But not replaced.

Nineteen years after he saw his brother die, he had come home from seeing his boy and girl off to the Hogwarts Express. Angelina was downstairs arguing with one of their manufacturers. The room was quiet, dark, grey.

He looked into a mirror unconsciously, to see himself for one reason or another. And standing there was his reminder, his identical twin smiling back at him. It was almost real, almost as if he were back from the dead.

Knowing better, George closed his eyes and walked away.

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_Sorry if there were any technical mistakes about his family or about what actually happened. This is just how I thought it would happen, because I'm a multiple and this is how I would feel if my sis died so suddenly._

_Enjoy! =)_


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